Vandoorne pleased by maiden qualifying effort

Formula 1 debutant Stoffel Vandoorne declared himself happy after he secured 12th position on the grid for the Bahrain Grand Prix.

Vandoorne, filling in for the unfit Fernando Alonso, progressed through Q1 and set the 12th best time in Q2, finishing two places ahead of team-mate Jenson Button.

"I'm quite happy at the moment," said Vandoorne, who has claimed three GP2 victories at the circuit.

"Since practice I felt very confident in the car, straightway I knew I could match Jenson’s lap times.

"It's always tricky to know after practice as you’ve got to put everything together more or less, we maximised everything today."

Vandoorne was nonetheless hesitant to place any targets on what can be achieved in Sunday's race.

"I don’t want to make any predictions for tomorrow, haven’t been thinking about it, have been focusing on qualifying, tonight and tomorrow we will focus on a lot of stuff but I think we can do a good job," he concluded.